The invention is related to the field of sensors, and in particular to a wearable system for monitoring physiological signals.
With the world population aging rapidly, providing care for the elderly is becoming an increasingly important problem. For instance, more than 5,000 people experience Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA) every week in the United States alone. The only definitive treatment for SCA is early defibrillation: no more than 6 minutes from arrest to first shock. The chance for survival drops 10% per minute without defibrillation, and today, over 95% of SCA victims die. Since automatic defibrillators are increasingly available, pervasive monitoring of those at risk can save many lives. Infants constitute another segment of the population where pervasive monitoring could enable rapid responses to life-threatening situations. In the United States alone, approximately 2,000 infants die each year from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Since slow heart-rate (bradycardia) is an important indicator of SIDS, early detection of bradycardia in infants can save many lives each year.
Wireless networks of context-aware body-mounted sensors have come into prominence recently for pervasive patient monitoring. However, to be effective, monitoring systems should be unobtrusive, robust, and low-cost.